Kind of, but not really, he says. “We use coffee extract from the Spice House in our coffee shake, and real bananas in our banana shake. We don’t do a strawberry shake specifically because I don’t want to use a fake strawberry flavor, or rock-hard supermarket berries.”

“It’s the main deal — the old spindle-type machine with metal cups. They whip at a lower speed,” Lakin says. “With a blender, more air gets whipped in. With the spindle, it stays very dense.”

The machine, a five-spindle eBay find, fits with the vintage vibe Lakin is going for. “It’s Art Deco-looking, but it also makes better shakes,” he says.

Also appealing to Lakin: The machine was made in Illinois by Sterling Multi Products.

In fact, the mixers are still being made just as they were when the company started in 1939, “with the same old dies and everything,” says Debbie Springman, whose father bought Sterling in the 1960s.

The company is in Prophetstown, about 130 miles west of Chicago. Sterling also makes equipment for John Deere and the heating and air conditioning industries, but the Multimixer has been a constant through the years.

This is the same mixer that a salesman named Ray Kroc sold to a California burger joint run by brothers Richard and Maurice McDonald. Kroc went on to start the McDonald’s chain.

At Edzo’s, there are nine flavors of the Five Dollar Shake. There is always a special shake du jour, too — it costs $5.